Sure enough, Amir was back the following evening with the very mattress Ronan had procured for him on his first night with the Merry Men, carrying it like it was easy. When asked how he'd traversed the city streets with a mattress without garnering drunken attention, Amir grinned coy. "It should come as no surprise that I've learned my way around the backroads."
It didn't, but the image of him hauling a narrow mattress down dark alleyways brought a small, twinkling laugh to Ronan's lips that surprised them both. He covered it with his hand, but the damage was done; Amir's eyes went round, and though he hid his smile in the downturn of his face, Ronan caught it all the same.
When Ronan climbed onto the bed that night, the lamplight illuminated his face in the mirror, and he saw his reflection for the first time in weeks. His hair was shaggier than he normally allowed, his skin warmer and tanner than it had been in years. When he scooted closer, he could just make out a scattering of freckles across his nose. He hadn't seen those since he was a kid playing along shadeless streets every day.
He brushed a hand through the front of his hair, sweeping it onto his forehead. In truth, he had never been as fond of the white patch as everyone else. It had always seemed too random, and the more he'd grown, the more it had reminded him of his father. Now, it fell to his eyebrow, and he found he didn't quite mind it like this. Untamed as it was, it bore little resemblance to Vernon. And it looked less out of place . . . elegant, maybe. Pretty, like Wendy had always said.
Ronan extinguished the lamp and tucked himself in, and he finally slept with his legs stretched out. Hanging off the edge, but stretched out nonetheless.
𓃦𓃦𓃦
Though he was waiting downstairs for the next visit nearly a week later, he was not at all ready for what Amir had in store.
Outwardly, he was mostly the same. Perhaps dressed a bit oddly, what with the all-black garb and the poncho over his torso, but he carried his usual food sack and nothing else. There was novelty in his eyes tonight, and when he pulled down the bandana to speak, the curve of his mouth promised something troublesome and his words were entirely strange.
"Change into something dark, will you?"
In the silence that followed, Amir procured a folded black garment seemingly from nowhere. Ronan blinked down at it, then back up at Amir. He took it and let it unfold until he was staring at an identical piece to the one Amir wore.
"What is this?"
"It's a hood."
Amir's mouth twitched some more when Ronan narrowed his eyes. "What do you suggest I do with this hood?"
"Most people wear them, I think."
"Amir."
"Ronan."
"What do you have planned?"
"Something fun, if you trust me," he said, then visibly regretted it. "I mean- if you can trust me, just for the night, or at least-" His lips drew into a line, gaze sliding to the wall. "Look," he amended. "You've been in low spirits-understandably so-but the other night I saw you smile, and I want . . ." He turned back to Ronan. "I have someplace I would very much like to show you. Can I, please?"
Ronan watched him a moment longer. Amir waited with bated breath and wanting eyes, and Ronan was helpless against him. He turned wordlessly for the second floor, where he changed into the sort of ensemble he would have used for a heist: black shirt and trousers, worn boots, leather gloves, and, because he didn't know what to expect, his toolbelt. The poncho was in fact hooded, so only a sliver of skin would be visible once he put on Amir's scarf.
"I don't suppose you'll tell me where it is we're going?" he groused, mildly impatient after finding himself hovering in one of Amir's backroads past midnight, waiting for Bandit to respond to his call.
"Do you have something against surprises, Ronan?"
"I find them disappointing," he deadpanned, even though Amir's last surprise had been anything but.
Annoyingly, Amir and his self-satisfied simper seemed just as aware of this. "Not this one."
Ever theatrical, he told Bandit their destination in a whisper hidden by his hands. Ronan used the sill of a boarded window to sling himself onto her back. "Hey, buddy," he greeted, rubbing along the sides of her neck as Amir looked between the windowsill and the horse, daunted. "Something holding you back?" Ronan asked, doe-eyed and a bit mean.
Bandit stomped her back hooves. Amir just about jumped out of his skin. Ronan leaned his forehead against her mane and gave her some extra-indulgent scratches. "That's my girl," he cooed.
Amir mounted behind him with plenty of struggle and little grace, mumbling about heinous horses. After a moment's hesitation, his arms came together around Ronan's waist. Ronan took a long breath and stared down at the dark lamp nestled between his legs where Amir gripped its handle. He did not lean back. But he wasn't so naive as to deny that he wanted to.
Ronan could write a thesis on human magnetism and never understand why his body was so inclined toward that ceaseless heat, or how Amir still felt so familiar when Ronan swore not to know him.
Bandit took off toward who-knew-where. The higher she climbed, the tighter Amir's arms circled. Ronan didn't know if it was out of fear or if that impossible pull went both ways, but by the time they leveled out, Amir was flush to his back.
Ronan was in far over his head.
"Do you always walk with a knife?" he asked when he noticed the hard press against his back.
"Two," said Amir. Naturally.
Ronan glanced down for an idea of where they were going, but the city streets were small beneath them. They all looked the same, anyway. Especially at night.
Ronan didn't often take Bandit out past dark. Partly because he didn't wish to disturb her sleep, partly because there was never much to see. Even on a cloudless night such as this, the roads were a bland muddle of black and yellow, and the city lights washed out the sky. Around him, everything was black.
Twice in as many months, Ronan had wound up on horseback in the dead of night, but this time was different from the last.
Or really, Ronan was different this time. Unbalanced and unmoored, he felt the sky around him like he hadn't before. The darkness was tangible, pressing in like walls around him. Steadying.
"I like this," murmured Amir. Ronan had to agree.
Gradually, the city thinned out, and the land beneath them turned so black Ronan couldn't tell forest from farmland. Where are we going? he wanted to ask again. Then he looked up and saw the stars, and he forgot the question altogether.
Ronan felt the moronic urge to greet them. He was spending too much time around Sadie.
"If you told me this was all you had to show me, I wouldn't even be disappointed." The quiet admission just barely carried over the beat of Bandit's wings.
A curious hum behind him. "Surely you've seen a hundred starry nights."
"Not like this."
"I'm glad you like it," said Amir. "But I do have a bit more to show you."
Under a sky so soothing, Ronan found it easy to lay his cheek onto Bandit's mane, only halfway caring where they might end up. The lull of the night must've gotten to Amir, too, because his grip was lighter than it had ever been while flying. Perhaps sensing their trust, Bandit flew steadier than ever. Ronan thought he could sleep like this, if only the clouds could catch him.
That is, until something made Bandit uneasy, and Ronan had to lock his legs as her glide teetered.
"Hey, hey." He ran a soothing hand down her neck. Bandit reared with an anxious whinny and stopped advancing altogether. "Hey-! What's wrong, buddy?"
"That means we're here."
For the first time in a while, Ronan looked down.
He sucked a sharp breath. Shut his eyes tight, opened them again, just to make sure-
"Amir . . . what?"
Ronan gaped down at what was unmistakably the royal castle.
It was indistinct at their altitude, and Ronan had never so much as seen a drawing of it, but he knew, just from its size, that the pinnacle of Diverran wealth was spread out before them.
"Why are we here?" he asked, a bit frenzied. Then, more importantly, "What has her so spooked?"
Bandit gave another backward jerk. Amir clamped down around Ronan's sides.
"Do you see the moat?" he prompted. Ronan squinted and made out a fat line curving around the castle. "It may seem outdated, but it serves to discourage invasions from above as much as attacks on foot. It's teeming with serpents-terrifying creatures, really-and pegasi are notoriously afraid of snakes."
"Amir, why are we-"
Ronan nearly bit off his own tongue as Bandit jolted again.
"Tell her she can go around!" Amir urged over her whinnying. "Bypass the moat and let us off in the forest!"
"Let us off-?" Ronan balked, but Bandit was growing more anxious by the second. He leaned forward and relayed Amir's command, and she took off to the right so fast he had to clamp his mouth shut.
She cut a wide arc around the castle, flying over the trees that surrounded it on three sides. Only when the moat was far behind did she calm down. She dipped into a slow descent, and the castle came into view.
It was nestled proudly atop a large hill, pale sandstone that reflected the moonlight so that the whole thing seemed to glow beyond the scarce light coming from within. Grand walls surrounded a vast green courtyard, pointed towers overlooked the forest, and around it all circled a dark blockade of deceivingly still water.
"Here is fine!" Amir called. Bandit dove toward the closest clearing, and Ronan's mouth dropped as they passed the treetops and continued down, down, down. By the time they landed, he had to stretch his neck to see the highest branches. It was the sort of forest that seemed thousands of years old; timeless trees with gnarled roots that tangled across the forest floor and crawled up thick, mossy trunks.
Bandit shot away the moment they dismounted, snapping Ronan from his gawking. He whirled on Amir to demand answers, but only managed a strangled sound from his throat when he saw what loomed behind them.
Any Diverran would recognize the figure from the island's endless collection of drawings and paintings and sculptures of its likeness. Nevertheless, nothing could've prepared Ronan for the sight of one of the castle's infamous Royal Beasts making a slow approach toward them.
It was a titanic creature, double Ronan's size in height alone. A hoofed four-legged monster covered in long white fur, with the wide nose and feline eyes of a leopard and great, branching antlers twice the width of its body.
Ronan knew from childhood stories that these were the fearsome protectors of the royal woods. Fast, powerful, and perfectly deadly to intruders. Those antlers were like spears.
And he and Amir were intruders.
He could see another spot of white in the distance. The forest was full of them. He doubted there was much point in running, but like hell he wasn't going to try.
He reached for Amir's arm, poised to turn on his heel, but Amir stepped in front of him with his hands raised to pacify. He approached the beast with slow, measured steps.
"Wrong way!" Ronan hissed, so exasperated he would've rolled his eyes if he wasn't terrified to take them off the deadly, colossal, deadly monster nearing them with raised hackles.
"Hello there," Amir said. The beast shook its mane threateningly, but Amir continued closer, blocking its path to Ronan. Its growl echoed between the trees, and Ronan braced for the worst.
Amir glanced over his shoulder, and he had the nerve to be grinning, like he wasn't bearing his chest to an animal that could impale him with a nod of its head. "They don't see too well. Their primary sense is smell." He turned back to the beast. "Isn't that right, Atlas?"
Amir stood directly in front of the beast, even dared to look away as he bent to lower Ronan's lamp, and yet it did not attack. This close, the difference in their size seemed unreal. Its enormity was emphatic; it dwarfed Amir, filling the space around him like a backdrop.
"I know it's been a while, but I hope you know I'll be hurt if you don't recognize me."
Ronan was tempted to pinch himself, but no-the beast really was leaning down, bending onto its front knees. With its head lowered, it was eye-level with Amir. Its antlers framed him like thorns, and Ronan thought through a lens of hysterical clarity-that peculiar insight one only achieved when suddenly faced with their mortality-that it made for a magnificent image.
Amir reached a hand out, laid it between the creature's eyes with his fingers spread. A noise from its throat reverberated beneath Ronan's feet, but there was no mistaking it for a growl. The great beast was purring as Amir stroked down its snout.
It closed its eyes and nuzzled Amir's face. Any more force would have sent Amir flying, but Amir laughed and hugged around its jaw. "I know, I know, I missed you too."
He rested his cheek against the beast's and looked over his shoulder to meet Ronan's bulging eyes.
"Come closer," he said. His smile was devastating. "He won't hurt you."
Ronan watched as the beast-Atlas, Amir had said-nudged his nose to Amir's hair. He blinked slowly, twin tourmaline moons waning and waxing without haste, and Ronan found that, in all of this, it was not hard to believe him.
Atlas' nostrils flared with Ronan's first step forward. His pupils widened from slits to crescents. Ronan stilled. "Are you sure?"
A hand extended toward him. "I would not risk your safety."
Ronan didn't falter again, even when eyes the size of his palm slid from Amir's face onto his. He gave his hand, and Amir guided it by the wrist to the dense, speckled fur above a wet black nose.
Atlas snorted at the touch. Ronan flinched away, but Amir's hand laid over his, holding him there long enough to realize he could feel the beast's purrs all the way up his arm.
Disbelieving laughter rose through an open-mouthed smile. Ronan scratched beneath a fluffy cheekbone and was rewarded with an overwhelming weight over his palm as Atlas leaned into the touch. It nearly knocked him off balance, but Amir's hand rose quickly to steady him, spread between his shoulder blades.
"He's wonderful," Ronan whispered. He gasped as Atlas gave a deep yawn, revealing rows of short arrowhead teeth and eight curved, yellow fangs the size of Amir's daggers. Shaking away sleep, Atlas stood to his full height, and Ronan was left to gape once more at the size of him.
"He is," agreed Amir, arms outstretched to pet along the beast's side as Atlas ambled away. "I wish I could introduce you to all of them."
"Can't you?" Ronan asked, eyes like a child's as he faced Amir.
"Perhaps on the way out," Amir chuckled. "There's still a little more I'd like to show you."
The lamp flickered to life and he set off through the trees. Ronan stared in place after Atlas, the giant beast in the giant forest, whose long feathery tail swept up fallen leaves in his wake. "When you said you served a very wealthy family . . ."
Amir threw a smirk over his shoulder. "Fabulously wealthy may have been a better way to put it, hm?"
Ronan could only huff an incredulous laugh and follow.
"There's a novel in the castle library I adored as a child," Amir said as Ronan fell into step. "King Eirik by S. de Lune."
He seemed to know the forest well; he picked expertly past gangly roots and forest brush while Ronan had to watch his step, focused on his feet in what little lamplight wasn't sucked up by the trees. He'd run through woods after many a heist, but none quite so unruly.
"I haven't heard of it."
Amir's mouth lifted at the corner. "No, I didn't think so."
Ronan found himself staring.
"It's a great book, though it's rather grave. It tells the story of an abusive king's descent into madness from the eyes of his youngest daughter."
Though Amir gazed ahead, his hand was there at Ronan's back like an instinct when he stumbled.
"The king drove his people to starvation to uplift a chosen few. He crushed dissent with public executions, but a revolution brewed regardless, and his enemies far outnumbered his allies. Despite the fortifications of his castle, the first attack took the life of the queen, and, driven to paranoia, he ordered the excavation of a series of tunnels beneath the castle as a last resort."
He slowed, raising the lamp to his chest. "King Eirik's tunnels managed to save his body, but it was too late for his mind."
One last stride put him ahead, facing Ronan, casting orange light over his face. Ronan's eyes were drawn behind him, to the ancient oak at his back. It wasn't nearly the tallest tree in the forest, but its trunk was impossibly broad, twisting at all angles so that some of its leaves nearly scraped the forest floor.
"Bit grim for a childhood story," said Ronan.
"Oh, but it was profoundly immersive. The descriptions of the tunnels, they felt so real." Stout roots seemed to climb from the oak into the ground, looping in and out of the moss like a loose stitch. Amir stepped onto one close to the trunk and looked down at Ronan. "What a surprise it was when I somehow found myself, on an entirely usual day-" he raised his foot to take another step back, "-falling into one."
Amir vanished.
Ronan choked out a yelp, tripping over roots in his scramble to crouch over the spot where Amir had just stood. Hidden by a low-hanging branch, lamplight glowed from a wide crack between the roots. Amir grinned up at him, unharmed and unabashed.
Ronan's jaw damn near fell through the hole, too.
"Won't you join me?" Amir invited.
"Into the castle?"
"Into the tunnel, and then into the castle, yes. There's a ladder if you'd like, but the fall isn't too bad."
"They'll have our heads if we're caught! And you-you especially can't afford to be seen by those who know you-"
"We won't be caught," Amir said with such conviction, Ronan struggled to doubt him. "I know this castle inside and out. I know it better than anyone who's lived here, and I've seen you in action. If I thought there was even a chance we might be seen-"
"I know," Ronan mumbled, biting the corner of his lip. Amir had said he would not risk Ronan's safety, and this, too, was strangely easy to believe.
There was a tingle at the nape of his neck, a familiar thrill he would never be able to douse, as he looked down into the unknown.
He braced his hands on the roots and dropped through the hole.
Hands at his shoulders caught him as he landed, a dull ache in his ankles telling him he perhaps should have opted for the ladder. He hardly noticed, too caught up in uneven stony ground and the smell of wet earth and the sudden, pressing quiet brought on by dirt walls that muffled the sounds of the forest. There wasn't much to see aside from a torch holstered to the wall and, past that, the darkness that stretched on beyond what the lamp could reach.
Ronan blinked his way back to Amir's face. "You . . . have bad memories of this place." Amir had never said as much outright, but Ronan knew. "Why come back here?"
"I am grateful for your concern," said Amir, squeezing Ronan's shoulders once before dropping his hands, "But you needn't worry for me."
"I asked why, Amir."
Amir bent to pick up the lamp. "You told me that you wanted to see the castle." He tilted his head as he rose, fixing challenging dark eyes on Ronan's face. "Have you changed your mind?"
He said it so casually, as if he hadn't just confessed that he was putting himself through this, risking his anonymity and returning to a place that had burned him, all because Ronan had mentioned once that he dreamed of setting foot inside the castle. Amir treated the words like they were weightless, but they settled heavy over Ronan's mind.
Surely there had to be more. Surely this couldn't all be worth it, just to-what, lift Ronan's spirits?
"You . . ." Slowly, Ronan's mouth unfurled into a grin. " You might be out of your mind."
He stole the lamp and took off down the tunnel to the tune of Amir's laugh. Amir jogged to catch up, and they were really doing it, they were really walking straight toward the castle.
The tunnel stretched for a few kilometers. There were no forks or doors, but it twisted wildly and unpredictably. The walls would yawn wide one moment and force them into single file the next; the floors went from smooth stone slabs to jagged rocks one had to step over carefully. All the while, Amir regaled him with a chapter of Diverran history that had been carefully hidden away: the reign of King Kirei.
He had ruled some four centuries ago, but all that was left to show for it was his portrait in the Great Hall and his name in a select few history texts. None went into the details of his tyranny or the revolution of his subjects.
"They don't want to give the people any ideas, I'd guess."
The only true recount of his rule was contained in King Eirik, and to all but Amir, this was but another tragic novel. He had discovered the first tunnel by accident, and his curiosity had naturally led him deeper in. At the underground entrance to the castle-an engraved plank door with a pointed crown, Ronan would soon find-a young Amir had finally realized why the whole thing had seemed so familiar: he had read it all before.
It was only once he found yet another tunnel using the novel as a guide that he truly believed it, and then it was a race to find them all, to learn who was behind it. After piecing together that Eirik was an anagram for Kirei, his research had led him to the real king's youngest daughter: Selenia, a name that meant "moon."
"S. de Lune," Ronan gasped.
"Incredible, isn't it?"
What was incredible, Ronan thought, was having a castle perched atop a hill, guarded inside and out, surrounded by a moat of serpents, and protected by a herd of monsters, only to be broken into by two barely-armed barely-men because they so badly wanted to erase the scorn of their history that they were ignorant of their own secret passages.
As the sole member of the household who had deemed it a worthwhile use of his time to explore the forest and befriend the beasts, Amir was perhaps the only person in centuries to know. Amir, and now Ronan.
Ronan didn't know what he'd done to be worthy of such a secret.
The end of the tunnel was a narrow staircase that led to a door. Amir left the lamp several paces back, so Ronan had to squint at the old cursive carved into the wood.
SOW PRIDE, REAP PROSPERITY
When he glanced back, Amir's face was obscured by the hood and the bandana and he was moving, crowding behind Ronan in the small space. "Open the door," he instructed. Fabric tickled Ronan's neck as Amir lifted the scarf hanging limp there; he tied it over Ronan's nose and mouth, then drew the hood over his head.
The graze of knuckles against his neck sent tingles to his fingertips as he undid the latch. With great caution, he pushed the door open to face the most dramatic dining hall he'd ever seen.
Arched windows on the wall opposite them reached the cathedral ceiling, shedding broad bands of moonlight over a massive hearth with an elaborately sculpted mantel on one end, a rich purple carpet leading up a dias to a pair of thrones on the other, and two tables between them long enough to fit fifty each.
Ronan was only allowed a moment to gawk before he was being nudged forward, then dragged to his left by the wrist. A curious glance behind him revealed a wall of portraits, each depicting a different Diverran ruler. None looked out of place. Where the tunnel door had been was a painting of a rather horrendous-looking man, beneath which a plaque read King Kirei II, 1416.
They stole toward the exit, a tall pair of doors past King Hector's portrait. "Listen," Amir said, voice low. Ronan pressed one ear to the wood and heard nothing, but he waited, and waited, until-
"Footsteps," he mouthed, nodding his head in the direction of the sound.
Nearly against his ear, Amir whispered, "Tell me when you can't hear them anymore."
"Now," Ronan said the moment the sound faded somewhere to his right. Amir held up five fingers where Ronan could see and counted down his hand once, twice, five times. Without warning, he pulled Ronan through, onto the patterned parquet floors of a vast hallway framed by a row of archways. The chandeliers above their heads were unlit, but the windows guided their hurried, quiet steps toward a spiral staircase at one end. Amir crouched and pried at the bottom step until it swung open, gesturing for Ronan to drop through as if this was all entirely normal.
They were plunged into darkness, but Ronan knew from the smell alone that they had landed in another tunnel. He heard the strike of a match right before a small flame appeared in Amir's grasp, one that bloomed large as he held it over a torch mounted to the wall.
"So?" Amir said, looking entirely smug. "What do you think?"
Ronan scoffed. Everything he hated about Diverra was embodied by this place. "I think it's ridiculous. Show me more."
This tunnel was much quicker and much smaller. They had to crouch the whole way through, and it never quite widened enough to keep their shoulders from brushing. At a dead end, Amir pressed his palms to a slat of marble above their heads, and with a quiet grunt, he pushed askew what turned out to be a goddamn altar.
Ronan climbed out first into a lavish chapel, washed in muted colors by a stained glass display that took up the entire wall behind the altar. They skirted down the aisle and pressed their ears to rounded doors. Amir waited for the footfalls of a patrolling guard to fade and counted down, this time from thirty, before opening up to another hallway. Pressed close to the walls, they slinked into the next room down: an all-white drawing room with candelabras mounted to every panel of the wall. There was an alcove on one end that nestled a mirror with an ornate golden frame. Ronan saw his own bright, wild eyes for a second before it swung open. A short drop later saw them in yet another tunnel, this one a bit dingier than the last.
Ronan hadn't any clue where they were going, but he found he didn't much care, happy to be led beneath the torchlight as Amir told him about his first time in every tunnel. His eyes shone as he recalled the exhilaration of matching each tunnel to its counterpart in the book like a pirate following a treasure map; the challenge of connecting passages he was never able to find; and the reprieve of having a place he could simply disappear to when it all became too much, where nobody could find him even if they searched all the grounds.
Ronan thought he could listen all night and never tire, but it was only a few minutes before they crawled out through the flank of a ceramic statue of the Royal Beast. Ronan snickered into his fist; Kirei must have really been losing it to come up with that one.
"It's alright," assured Amir. "Nobody can hear us in here."
They were in the largest library Ronan had ever seen. He felt a pang in his chest as he thought that Felix would be at his happiest here, where bookcases stretched to the ceiling. Ronan wished he could bring a book back for him.
"Here it is!" Amir cheered, and Ronan looked up to find him halfway climbing one of the shelves, holding a small, timeworn book. He hopped down when Ronan approached. The only words inscribed on the cover were KING EIRIK.
Ronan ran his finger along the worn leather binding. "You should keep it," he mused.
"You think?"
Looking up put them closer than Ronan had anticipated. He was grateful for the fabric between their faces, over his cheeks. "The secret's as good as yours. And you should take what's yours."
That seemed to tie Amir's tongue. He hovered there a moment, studying what little he could see of Ronan's face before suddenly looking away. Tucking the book somewhere within his clothes, he turned toward another corner of the library.
A shorter bookshelf opened up like a door when Amir pulled. They descended for the last time, and it was only a minute before they were pressing themselves to a rectangular block in the wall. A sixty second count, and they emerged behind a woven tapestry of a map of Diverra to a more modest hall than they'd seen so far.
A trace of something delicious lingered in the air. It seemed Amir was headed right toward it, deeper into the hall and down a short set of stairs toward a door that smelled of too many flavors for Ronan to pinpoint just one.
"We have arrived," he announced, quieter than he'd been in the library, as they entered into an expanse of hanging pots and wooden counters and cast-iron stoves. Ronan hardly noticed any of that, beelining for a table at the center that was covered to the last inch with food.
"Leftovers aren't disposed of until morning," Amir enticed at his back.
"You brought me all the way here," Ronan said through a watering mouth, "to treat me to dinner?"
"Is that so wrong?" Amir asked, just this side of teasing. Fragile wings fluttered in Ronan's chest.
They settled into the corner farthest from the door and spoke in hushed voices over a delicious, albeit cold meal of four courses. Amir led him through the proper order: broccoli soup and Dover sole first, stuffed roast goose and shepherd's pie next, then a walnut salad and three types of cheese. It ended in rich white wine and treacle tarts and raspberry pudding and something sweet and gelatinous Amir called a "blancmange."
Ronan didn't much more than sample each item and was nonetheless filled to bursting by the end. At some point, he gave into the quiet pull that had been nagging at him the entire night, the entire month, ever since Amir's appearance in his periphery, and leaned onto the shoulder beside his.
In the short few minutes before they stood, Ronan imagined wielding a capsule that could trap a moment in time. He would choose this one, the quiet intermission of an immensely strange night. He would lock away the heaviness of his stomach and the sweet taste lingering in his mouth and the warmth of the body next to him, and he'd be the only person in the world with the key to unlock it. He would selfishly keep it to himself, the feeling of being sated and content and cared for, as a reminder that occasionally, rarely, he was allowed to receive without giving anything in return.
The way back was much like the way they'd come. They were perhaps a bit slower in the tunnels, weighed down by their meal and in no particular rush, and they traversed the castle's first floor without incident.
It would have been a seamless exit had it not been for Amir's penchant for stolen weapons. They were in the Great Hall, halfway to the final tunnel, when Amir stopped to examine an antiquated suit of armor displayed against the wall. The knight bore a spear and shield and wore a rapier at its hip, but Amir's attention was on the long, narrow dagger in its hand.
"Well this is new," he muttered.
He wriggled it from the knight's grasp and tucked his fingers into the wide knuckle guard. With his thumb, he pressed a mechanism near the hilt and, with the quiet hiss of metal sliding against metal, the blade split into three.
"Ooooh," Ronan ribbed. Amir flicked the dagger at him, then slid the blade closed and tucked it with his others.
As he turned away, the bang of metal crashing to the floor halted them both.
Ronan blinked down at the dismembered hand of the suit of armor as it rolled along the marble. Inappropriately, perhaps a bit insanely, he had to smother a laugh with both hands.
Distant footsteps pounded beyond the hall doors. Amir grabbed Ronan's hand and made a break for the unfortunate portrait of King Kirei, practically throwing the painting open and shoving Ronan through. They stood with their backs to the engraved wood, eyes saucer-wide, as the door to the hall burst open with a great slam.
It was a long couple of minutes as the guard went about his inspection. There was a squeak as the knight's hand was replaced, and then, eventually, the click of the door.
Ronan jumped the steps and broke into a run.
There was no good reason for it. There was nobody chasing them, no train they needed to catch, no excuse other than that the climb in his heartbeat, the whip of his hair around his face as his hood flew back, all of it felt right in a way Ronan didn't care to understand. The thud of his feet against the stone-and Amir's once he started after him, confused but unwavering-filled the tunnel until Ronan burst into laughter, drowning all else out.
They had just broken into the island's most guarded property through a secret tunnel from a drama novel to steal some leftover food, of all things. The bizarreness of it, the familiar headrush of a successful heist and the unfamiliar delight of one with no consequences, the idiocy that had to have possessed Amir to do something so reckless-all of it came together in a raucous, full-bellied laugh that had Ronan clutching his stomach and slowing his speed.
He heard Amir laughing, too, and looked over his shoulder to see eyes alight with mirth and a wide grin lit gold by the lamp in his grip. Ronan realized that, up until this point, he had been unfamiliar with the true berth of Amir's laugh; he hadn't known he could smile like this, wide and imperfect, boyish and honest and a bit asymmetrical, and so fond Ronan nearly lost his step.
Ronan felt his chest expanding, growing wide and deep to hold his bliss. The feeling was like racing on Bandit's back, like flying. It took him over, made him feel so light he lost track of his feet. He let himself fall against the wall, head thrown back into the dirt.
Amir made a grab for his elbow and wound up getting dragged along. He caught himself with a palm slammed against the wall before they could meet head-on, but it was a near thing.
Ronan shut his eyes and let himself laugh like he hadn't in months, or maybe years-like he hadn't since thieving had lost its luster and the world had stopped being fascinating.
He only started to sober once he realized he was the only one laughing. His eyes fluttered open to Amir leaning over him, looking inexplicably stricken.
"What's wrong?" Ronan asked, winded.
Amir's eyes roamed Ronan's face, afflicted with the same quiet sort of awe Ronan had felt watching the stars from Bandit's back, like he was seeing a familiar view for the first time. They breathed in harmony, chests nearly meeting with every heavy inhale.
Then Amir's eyes settled over Ronan's lips, and Ronan stopped breathing altogether.
Amir bent onto his forearm, leaving centimeters between them. Ronan was dizzy with it.
Heaving a frustrated sigh, Amir dropped his forehead onto his fist. "Sorry," he muttered. "I'm sorry."
Silence echoed off the tunnel walls.
"I don't know why . . ." he said, close enough now that his sardonic laugh pressed against Ronan's shirt. "I've spent my life around royalty, and yet when it comes to you I can't seem to grasp simple fucking propriety."
He pushed off of the wall, dragging a hand over his face. "I mean no disrespect." He took a distancing step back. "I know I betrayed your trust, and you don't think of me as you once did, and things cannot magically go back to the way they were, and . . ." he trailed off as he took another step and met resistance. His gaze dropped down, where Ronan's hand at the hem of his hood kept him rooted in place. " . . . And you're holding onto me."
They stood exactly an arms' length apart, just as Ronan had planned.
"I've . . ." he met Amir's unsure stare as it traveled back up to his face. "Never cared much for propriety."
He pulled, just barely, but Amir fell into him like he'd been dragged. He cupped Ronan's face with his free hand and pulled him in just enough that when they collided, they sank together against the wall.
Ronan felt Amir's lips and understood at once that he had never been kissed before today. Not really, not like this. In the chaste moment it lasted, Ronan finally learned the impossibility of being wanted. He had always found kisses forgettable, but this one would ruin him.
He was left, in the breath passed between them as they broke apart, to face the magnitude of what he'd just opened.
When Ronan was sixteen, Tony had purchased a set of tarot cards from the lazy-eyed lady who sold elixirs and hexes at the market. Ronan had reluctantly pulled The Fool at Tony's insistence and promptly tuned out whatever she'd had to say about it, but with each passing day he resonated more with the boy on the card, walking unknowingly toward the edge of a cliff. He often wished he'd listened.
Nobody stayed in his life long enough to be worth the pain of missing, Ronan knew that, and yet he could never seem to help himself from going too far, asking too much, grasping at what he couldn't have.
Doubt must have shown on his face. "It's alright," Amir said, drawing Ronan's eyes up from his chest. His hand traced Ronan's jaw, then dropped to his side. "Take your time. I can wait."
He shifted to step away, and Ronan abruptly recognized that, whatever he wanted, it wasn't that.
His hand twisted tight around dark fabric, and Amir let himself be led. He was surprisingly soft-his hand on Ronan's face, the press of his mouth, the give of his lips. He touched Ronan like he was someone precious, something to behold. Amir kissed to give. Ronan wanted to take.
He reached into disheveled hair, anchoring them together. Amir gasped at the tug and Ronan swallowed it greedily, short of breath but not ready, not nearly ready, to part yet. Amir's lips on his were something he would never move on from, but that was a risk he was willing to take to be kissed so honestly.
"Ronan."
He swallowed that, too, gratified by a sigh against his cheek.
"Ronan," again, moments later. "Ronan."
Ronan leaned his head against the wall. Amir stared down the space between them.
"You . . . you're certain?" he asked. "We don't have to-I'll take you any way I can have you. I won't leave if this isn't what you want. "
That only made Ronan want to kiss him more.
"And if you want me to ease off-"
"Do not do that." Ronan gripped the back of his neck. "I'll be very angry with you if you do that."
Amir started to smile.
"I am sure," Ronan said firmly. It was about time he accepted that he was attracted to what he didn't know, drawn to what he hadn't yet understood. His favorite thing to do was to learn. "Are you?"
"Am I? You can't be serious-"
"I know," Ronan grinned, tugging him back in. This time, Amir didn't hesitate to chase his every breath, and vanilla and raspberry rose among Ronan's favorite flavors with every taste of his tongue. He gave up carrying his own weight and Amir gladly pressed him into the wall, holding him fast with one hand on his waist and every inch of them connected. "Mm, wait." Ronan ran his hand along Amir's hanging arm, stopping when his palm rested over Amir's fingers on the lamp handle. "Put this down."
The pull of strong arms around his back felt like being consumed. Amir was passionate in the way a stream rushed over rocks, surging and determined but obligingly gentle. Too mild to sweep him away but powerful enough to carry him if he pleased. Ronan gave himself eagerly to the current.
The journey out of the tunnel was slow and indulgent and peppered with distracted stops. Amir was easily set off; getting through the narrowest portions was nearly impossible when every other touch ended in someone being kissed into a wall. They got sidetracked if Ronan so much as looked at him too long, but how could he not look when Amir wore a smile so brilliant?
His hands on Ronan's waist were hardly necessary as he climbed out between the oak roots, but Ronan didn't for a second complain. Shrouded by morning fog that hugged the trees, Amir spent the minutes awaiting Bandit's arrival introducing Ronan to Calypso, a Royal Beast larger and haughtier than Atlas, whose fur was lined with faint gray stripes only visible when the moonlight struck them just so. She didn't allow much more than a caress down her shoulder, poised proud and elegant with her body curved protectively around them. She raised her head as a winged silhouette appeared through the trees, lifting her nose with a huff that rustled the leaves, but a calm command from Amir and an outstretched hand splayed before her face were all it took to assuage her.
Inquisitive yellow eyes trailed Amir, then Ronan as they mounted. Bandit kept a wary distance but did not bow her head. They took to the air to the tune of deep, rumbling farewell croon, and there was no shyness as Amir hugged his arms around Ronan's middle this time around.
Little by little, the rush wore away. Ronan's mouth stretched in a yawn and Amir slumped forward, pliant with sleep. The sky was beginning to lighten.
Hands slipped beneath Ronan's hood to hold him through his shirt. They didn't talk.
The peace was disrupted by a flicker of light that he mistook, the first time, for spots in his vision. The second, he looked to his left and noticed they were not alone; a small flock of lizard-like creatures flew in a pointed formation just beneath them. There was a flash of orange as the leader blew sparks from its nostrils, and suddenly they scattered around Bandit's every side.
"Dragons," Amir breathed, the delight in his voice surely mirrored on Ronan's face. Diverran dragons were scarce, elusive critters. Ronan had only seen them a scarce couple of times, and never so close or so many at once.
They were scaly little things in an array of earthy colors, the largest of them the length of Ronan's forearm, with long leathery wings and fat, triangular heads. They hovered curiously around an uncaring Bandit, swooping in for a better look and then darting away when her wings got too close. Sparks and tiny flames burst in Ronan's vision whenever one got especially excited or startled.
They seemed particularly interested in Amir. He laughed as a green head poked around his ear, flicking its forked tongue, and just barely dodged getting his hair singed.
"They know you're Shaelan," Ronan joked.
"If only," Amir snickered, though he glowed at the idea.
The dragons hovered around them until they'd looked their fill. One-by-one, they grew bored and dropped out of sight. Ronan thought they had all gone when,
"Ronan?"
"Hm?"
"There is a dragon on my shoulder."
". . . Hm?"
Ronan turned his head to see terracotta legs draped over Amir's collarbone and round amber eyes blinking owlishly at him. He meant to laugh, but what came out instead was a starry-eyed sigh. He halfway believed the last several hours had been a dream. One night couldn't be so perfect.
Some minutes later, the last dragon flapped away and Amir hooked his head over Ronan's shoulder, pressing a kiss beneath his jaw, and Ronan knew not even he could create a delusion so tangible.
After Bandit's departure from the backroad, Amir pulled him close by the collar. It started as something brief, but that got lost somewhere along the streetlines as Amir curled his hands behind Ronan's neck and pulled the both of them into the alley wall.
In a herculean display of will, Ronan ducked his head. "The sun will soon rise. You should go."
Thumbs beneath Ronan's jaw raised his face. Amir held him like that, a tender touch on either side of his throat, and leaned down into a lingering kiss. He tipped his head back, eyes still closed, and said, "I am going to die."
"You are not going to die."
"I am. You've killed me."
Ronan reached for the bandana around Amir's neck. "Such a shame," he said, tugging it up over his mouth. "I quite liked you alive."
He brushed a quick kiss over Amir's mouth through the fabric.
"I'm revived."
Ronan scoffed and shoved him into the wall, turning on his heels to leave.
"Goodnight!" Amir called after him.
"It's dawn!"
"Good morning, then!"
With his back turned, Ronan had no reason to bury his smile as he ducked out of the alleyway. He found in the coming days that he couldn't even if he tried. It hovered on his cheeks, hopelessly honest.
𓃢𓃢𓃢
Song for this chapter: Snow On the Beach by Taylor Swift (ft Lana del Rey)
the continuation of my midnights brainrot. there's still more. this song coming from ronan actually makes me a little insane